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April 29, 2009

HIGHLAND HEIGHTS -- Northern Kentucky University will expand employee health-care benefits, including coverage for domestic partners, putting it in the middle of a political battle over benefits for same-sex partners.

NKU regents Monday approved the benefits package, which would allow employees to add family members or others to their plan when a spouse is not covered.

It would require that the covered person live in the employee's household for at least 12 months and be "financially interdependent" with the employee. The employee would pay the cost.

State Sen. Damon Thayer, R-Georgetown, chairman of the Northern Kentucky Legislative Caucus, supported a bill earlier this year to ban universities from offering benefits to same-sex partners of employees.

While that bill never came to a House vote, Thayer said the ban would have broad support both in the legislature and with the public.

"I find NKU's decision disappointing and a bit of slap in the face of the will of the people of Kentucky," Thayer said.

State Rep. Dennis Keene, D-Wilder, said the decision is NKU's and state government should not be involved.

"I know Northern will take a lot of heat for doing this, particularly from those in the Republican Party," Keene said. "But legislators should stay out of it. Northern has a lot of courage to be doing this. It is their decision to make."

NKU has mostly avoided the political battles so far, preferring to let the University of Kentucky and the University of Louisville take the lead.

But NKU officials said the extended benefits would help attract and retain better employees. They noted that it could cover an adult child or a sibling as well as a live-in partner of either sex.

The University of Cincinnati extended full benefits to domestic partners of about 6,500 employees last fall.

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